`Sometimes I`ll Slap People To Get Their Attention.`

A Rush Street Bouncer Explains Why It Pays To Be Polite.

March 03, 1985

At 6-foot-7, 275 pounds, Dave Buhmann is probably the biggest bouncer on Rush Street. He is also probably the only one who is studying to be a librarian.

By day, the bushy-bearded, bespectacled Buhmann, 31, is studying for a master`s in library science. By night, he patrols the floor of Mother`s, 26 W. Division Street, in the heart of the rowdy Rush Street area. He started last St. Patrick`s Day, which he says is akin to ``jumping into the fire``--

inasmuch as it is the single toughest night of the year.

Buhmann has worked as a bouncer on and off for 10 years, moonlighting even during a five-year stint as a medical lab technician in the Navy. After the service, Buhmann earned a bachelor`s degree in health sciences from Western Illinois University. While in school, he spent an internship as a lecturer on sex education for Planned Parenthood. Those experiences, he recently told SUNDAY, Magazine staff writer Paul Weingarten, helped fully prepare him for his work at Mother`s.

I`m basically a nonviolent person. I don`t enjoy hitting people. But there are times when you have to. I broke my hand one time hitting a guy; he was coming at one of the other bouncers and I caught him right underneath the eye and broke his cheek bone. It was the first time I ever punched anyone that hard.

This doesn`t have to be a violent job if you handle people right. Probably the most important thing in my job is how well you can interact with people, how fast you can size up a situation. I`ve been doing this for so long I can tell just by looking at people what`s going to happen. I hate to say it, but it`s mostly men. Rarely are there fights or problems with women. The men aren`t even fighting over the women. What are they fighting about? No one knows. And we rarely find out because we just want to get them out.

I really don`t think any good bouncer enjoys a confrontation. But it`s gotta be done. Sometimes I`ll slap people to get their attention, or wrestle them to the floor and sit on them. And if there`s blood, we call the police. And everybody`s who`s been in the fight, whether it was their fault or not, is out of the bar. We press charges, too, for personal injury.

The number of fights depends on the season. Summertime is bad because the college kids are back and they haven`t really learned how to act in a bar. We really dread Thanksgiving, the Christmas holidays. But St. Patty`s is the worst night of the year. It`s amateur night.

But we`ll shut a fight down real quick. When we have someone get clipped over the head, like it happened to one of our guys a while back, then it`s heaven help the guy who swung. Then they complain, ``You guys are picking on me.`` But it`s like, wait a minute, you swung at us first. Because we cannot swing first. There`s no way we can swing first and no one on our staff is going to. We don`t have to take a punch, but they have to swing.

We have this little catch phrase: DOR. Drunk, Obnoxious, and Rude. Those are the three things that can get you kicked out of the bar, any bar.

Mother`s had a real rowdy reputaton for years, because there was live music down here. Now we`ve switched over to a dee jay, it`s quieted down. But still, we hire bouncers for size. We hire big guys because it`s intimidating. My size is intimidating to most people. And when I need to break something up I use the Voice of God technique: ``Gentlemen, let`s be quiet.`` And it works. Because they`re down there and I`m way up here.

With my size, I have an advantage over everybody. And if I grab somebody I`m gonna just pick him right up off the floor. And once they`re up off the floor, they just look around like, ``What am I doing here.`` And they quiet down.

My hours are 9 p.m. to 4 a.m. Sometimes, when it gets slow, I talk to the customers. When people ask what I do, I tell them I`m in grad school studying library science and that I plan to get another master`s degree in sexology. And then I get all sorts of questions about sex. Women ask me a lot of questions about birth control. A lot of them go to their doctors, and doctors write them out a prescription without much advice. I`ll try to answer their questions, or refer them to books. Guys have their problems, but they`re not going to talk to me. I used to teach male sexuality classes, and it`s really hard for a guy to admit he`s having problems.

We make about $5 an hour, and it can get really boring if you don`t enjoy just watching people. Sometimes we make more. There was one guy in one night, he gave me 20 bucks to walk him 50 feet to the bathroom. He was so out of it. But that`s unusual.